We have a new UA release with two subclasses. The College of Spirits Bard is a fortune teller or spirit medium type character with a big random effect table. Meanwhile the Undeath Pact Warlock is a a do-over of the Undying Pact Warlock.
As for the PC who has a life changing experience... for that, maybe it's better to just tear up the old character sheet and convert them to a PC of the new class of the same level and ability scores. It's a bit of an extreme change, but that's what we're talking about isn't it?
I guess, but there are also a lot of times that that gets framed by people in discussions as being toxic for the game. Whether they call you a powergamer, a munchkin, a min-maxxer.
And, weirdly but I guess because these people avoid even talking about the extreme examples, the simpler and more obvious the "powergaming" the more push back you get. Built a Polearm-Sentinel Hexblade Paladin and you get a mild shrug. Say that you play rogues who take a race with +2 Dex and you are a monster.
It is weird.
The UA feats, IMO, cover any narrative needs that are currently handled by multiclassing. I don't think we need another reason to shoot down new content.Most of the non-naughty word stories of multiclass character I've seen involve a PC undergoing a major shift in career aspirations or life goal during the course of a campaign. The Fighter or Rogue who finds a holy cause and becomes a Paladin would be the archetypal example. In many respects this treats the levels in the initial class as an extended Background, the prelude before the character reaches their true narrative endpoint.
This is a fairly niche purpose. One that, at least on Internet forums, gets completely eclipsed by optimized builds that mix classes simply to cherry pick ability combinations and give zero narrative consideration to what you're drafting. Is it worth putting up with the latter to preserve the former? I'm not so sure it is. The new UA multiclass lite feats seem a much better fit for a PC who wants to dabble in a different field. As for the PC who has a life changing experience... for that, maybe it's better to just tear up the old character sheet and convert them to a PC of the new class of the same level and ability scores. It's a bit of an extreme change, but that's what we're talking about isn't it?
It isn’t up to anyone, it’s just a statement of fact that there is a difference between the colloquial meaning of the term and a particular academic use of it.
That's your choice.
Personally, I would consider a player who was "good at the game" is someone who can immerse themselves in a character and perform them entertainingly.Yeah, that's all true. Still find it annoying that a default positive experience assumes the player's aren't good at the game, but what are you going to do?
A character who changes jobs would be the obvious example - and is generally the only situation when I allow multiclassing.But I'm skeptical that there are narrative concepts that can only be realized through multiclassing.
So how about some examples?
It's your choice to think what you do. I don't have to agree with your assessment, however.Nothing to do with choice, it simply isn't up to either of us.
Hey! Anyone remember how the War Mage is basically a mix of the Evocation and Abjuration schools of magic for wizards? If they moved the Spirits bard subclass to the Wizard, it could be a Necromancy/Divination based subclass, so we could actually have another subclasss that takes two schools of magic and merges them into one.
Anyone else like this idea? I personally wish they made more subclasses like this, that merge two schools of magic (Hypnotism from Illusion and Enchantment, Shadowfell from Illusion and Necromancy, Limbo-Mages from Conjuration and Transmutation, Fleshwarpers from Necromancy and Transmutation, etc).
You mean I could potentially make an Ace Attorney style Spirit Medium in 5e?
If that's the case then sign me up.
Y'know, that's not a bad idea. Find a theme for mixing up the spell schools, and turn those themes into subclasses for the Wizard.
Could even come with mixed school spells, if they want to play around with that idea. The simple rule for that would be "The count as both spell schools for purposes of the _____ Savant Wizard subclass features (reminder: they let you scribe spells of that school into your book in half the time and I believe price.) and for the purposes of Detect Magic".
Could certainly be played that way. That sounds cool.
Yeah. There are a lot of themes that could be explored beyond the current subclasses by doing this:
There's a lot of ideas they could play with if they leaned more into this way of designing subclasses for wizards, starting with the Spirits bard becoming a wizard subclass (or having both).
- Order of Magicians with Conjuration and Illusion, summoning doves and rabbits and performing illusions.
- Necroblaster (would need a better name) with Evocation and Necromancy, that shoots people with necrotic energy and uses souls of the deceased to attack others upon death.
- Phaser as Conjuration and Evocation, where you can cause attacks to go through solid objects and flesh, warping the space around you to give resistance to creatures for certain damages, etc.
- Transitor, Illusion and Transmutation to create objects that aren't really there, but can be interacted with, and so on.
I like the idea of using dual schools of magic to create a theme for a magical tradition. I've thought of a few different traditions (mostly just names) but spiritualist didn't occur to me. I think two of them might have been your hypnotism (mind-bender) and shadowfell (shadow). I like the sound of fleshwarper, makes me think of the Phyrexians from magic the gathering but with undead instead of mechanical pieces.